This invention relates to apparatus for connecting at least one recovery station to preselected recorders, in succession, to recover information jobs from those recorders and, more particularly, to such apparatus which is useful in an information processing system, such as a central dictation system, whereby information jobs that are recorded on several recorders may be recovered therefrom by a particular recovery station, such as a transcribe station, which switches from one to the next recorder automatically. The present invention also relates to apparatus for monitoring and storing data related to the information jobs, or messages, recorded on each recorder and, more particularly, to such apparatus which indicates that only a single one of several information jobs, or messages, is "assigned" to the recovery, or transcribe, station connected to that recorder.
This invention is related to the system disclosed and claimed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,319,337, issued to the assignee of the present invention. The present invention also is related to the monitoring and displaying apparatus described in copending application Ser. No. 496,654, filed May 20, 1983.
In a central information processing system, such as a central dictation system, information originating from several originating stations is processed, or recorded, by individual processing devices or recorders for further use. Recovery stations, such as transcribe stations, are connectable to the individual processing devices in order to recover the information therefrom.
In a central dictation system, it has been the practice heretofore of connecting an individual transcribe station to a particular recorder for the transcription of dictated messages. After all, or at least selected ones, of the dictated messages are transcribed, the transcribe station remains idle until additional messages are recorded. As an alternative, and to improve the efficiency of transcription in such a central dictation system, each transcribe station may be manually disconnected from one recorder and then connected to another such that the transcriptionist may transcribe additional messages from the other recorder. Typically, the transcribe station is provided with a suitable plug that is inserted into a compatible socket on the recorder. This plug-socket connection thus provides suitable paths for control signals and audio information, whereby the operation of the recorder may be controlled and the dictated messages may be played back and perceived by the transcriptionist.
A major disadvantage of the central dictation system described above is the requirement of a manual interconnection between a particular transcribe station and desired ones of the recorders. To effect change-overs in such connections, the transcribe station must be physically disposed in close proximity to the recorders or, alternatively, a supervisory operator must be present in order to disconnect the transcribe station from one recorder and to connect it to another. Furthermore, suitable communication must be established between the transcriptionist and the supervisory operator in order to apprise the latter when it is necessary to change-over the connection to the recorder.
The aforementioned difficulty is compounded when it is desirable, or even necessary, to locate transcribe stations remotely from the recorders. For example, such change-overs in the connections between the transcribe station and the recorders is made more difficult if the communication path therebetween includes a telephone line.
While automatic switching apparatus generally is known, it is desirable, in the environment of an information processing system, to control that apparatus in various different modes. For example, it may be desirable to select recorders, at random, to which the transcribe station is to be connected, but the successive connections should be in a predetermined order. Also, it would be advantageous to permit a supervisory operator to substitute different recorders for those which had been selected and, additionally, to modify the order in which the transcribe station is connected to those recorders. This would facilitate unattended change-over operations and provide the transcriptionist with a "full schedule" of work. Hence, after-hour transcription could be accomplished with minimum personnel, thus improving the overall cost of the transcribing operation.
Another difficulty in controlling automatic switching equipment resides in different criteria which may be established for change-over connections. For example, it may be desirable to connect the transcribe station to the different recorders in an order determined by the "backlog" of messages awaiting transcription in each recorder. One type of recorder that typically is found in a central dictation system is the endless-loop recorder of the type described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,817,436. In this recorder, separate dictate and transcribe ports are provided so as to permit dictation to proceed while, simultaneously, the previously dictated messages may be transcribed. In such a recorder, the backlog of messages awaiting transcription may change and may even increase while messages are being transcribed. Thus, since the backlog of endless-loop recorders may change dynamically, the determination of which recorder exhibits the greatest backlog so as to be connected to the transcribe station presents some difficulty in controlling the switching apparatus.
Still further, in central dictation systems having a high level of activity, it is possible that messages may not be transcribed for a substantial period of time. It may be desirable, therefore, to control the switching apparatus to connect the transcribe stations successively to different recorders in order to transcribe such old messages. Here too, it is difficult to control the switching apparatus to insure that old messages, that is, those messages that had been recorded prior to some predetermined time, are transcribed promptly. That is, it is difficult to control the switching apparatus so as to connect the transcribe station to one recorder for transcribing all old messages therein, and then to another recorder for transcribing the old messages, and so on.
Yet another difficulty associated with central dictation systems having endless-loop recorders is the ability to assign separate messages within a recorder, one message at a time, to a transcriptionist for transcription. For example, in the monitoring and displaying system described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,319,337, all of the dictated messages which are awaiting transcription in an endless-loop recorder are designated as being "assigned" to the particular transcribe station (or transcriptionist) which then is connected to the recorder. Data, referred to as "job records", relating to the messages which are recorded on this recorder are provided with "assigned" status, thereby designating all of such messages as being assigned for transcription by that transcriptionist. Inquiries by the supervisory operator as to those messages will be answered, in part, with the indication that those messages have been assigned to a particular transcriptionist. However, if the transcriptionist is unable to complete transcribing all of those messages or, alternatively, if another transcriptionist is connected to the recorder, the job record data relating to those untranscribed messages, and particularly the "assigned" status designation, may not be updated. Hence, erroneous information may be provided the supervisory operator in response to inquiries relating to those messages.
Notwithstanding the aforementioned disadvantage, it has not been provided heretofore merely to assign a message on an endless-loop recorder to a particular transcriptionist when and only when that message is in the process of being transcribed. Rather, it has been the practice to assign all messages on that recorder to the transcriptionist, even though some of those messages may never be transcribed thereby.